Hiatus
by squarey
Summary: Something to keep me busy over Hiatus. A slow throw over the events of "Frame".
1. Chapter 1

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Scene 1

Hiatus. A period of time where one is on a break. It's a nice word. Hiatus. I need a break. I wonder, though, can you take a hiatus from life? I mean I think you can take a hiatus from work, or from a relationship, but I wonder if you can take one from life in general. Probably not.

I'm lying in the darkness of the bedroom – not my bedroom, in the comfort of a bed – not my bed, next to someone whose name I cannot remember. My life is a conflagration of bad decisions. I slip from the bed and pad barefoot across the room. I retrieve my belongings and my clothes from the floor and beat a hasty retreat into the hallway. I let myself into the bathroom and wash up a bit, running my fingers through my hair. _What the hell am I doing_? I think to myself. _What the hell have I done_?

I study my reflection for a moment, trying to decide if there is any aspect of myself that I recognize. I reach out and touch the reflection of my nose and smudge my fingers down the mirror across the image of my lips. I cannot remember the last time I smiled – a real smile that I felt inside of me. I withdraw my touch from my reflection and I stand for a moment, simply breathing, or at least trying to remember how to breathe.

I'm wearing his shirt. It's way too long for me, reaching well down my thighs. It is a midnight blue. I think back to last night. He is handsome, dark t-shirt, blue button down, graying hair. He is tall, not lean, dark eyes, a slight beard. He is private. He hasn't really spoken with any one most of the night, his body language closed. I am drawn to him because he is private. I do not want the noisy man sitting next to me, bumping into me, trying to buy me drinks. I want the private man, the quiet man, the man that looks kind of broken like me.

I'm standing in his bathroom, slowly unbuttoning the shirt, thinking I could've just as easily shrugged it off over my head. I wonder if that's what happened last night. Did he simply pull it up and over his head or did we somehow find the dexterity to unbutton the tiny tortoiseshell buttons? I think we pulled it off over his head. It's a wonder that we didn't break any of the buttons in our haste. I lay the shirt aside and reach for my things. I pull on my underwear first and then my bra. I try to fasten the clasp of the bra behind my back and cannot seem to get the catch to work. Finally I pull the bra off and look at the fastener – it is all bent to hell. Here is one thing we mangled in our haste to remove our clothes. With my fingers I push the fastener back into shape and quickly clasp my bra into place. I step into my dress, tying the wrap around my waist.

Preserving the darkness of his apartment, I turn off the light in the bathroom before I open the door. Still barefoot I walk down the short hall to the main living space. Something shiny catches my eye on the kitchen table. I walk toward it and stand staring at a police badge and weapon. He's a cop. I remember now, a detective. I reach out toward the badge, wallet splayed open on the table. Robert Goren. _Bobby_. His name is Bobby.

It's still pitch black outside, dawn is an hour away. I need to get home, catch a shower, and get to work for the day. I spot my shoes near the doorway. They are cast aside, leaning against the wall. I remember him picking me up off my feet, pushing my back against the wall, kissing the air out of my lungs. I remember my shoes slipping off my feet, his left hand pressing across my breasts, keeping me pinned against the wall with the weight of his hips. I flush slightly from that visceral memory. I wonder if he will remember the feel of my breasts in his hands. I wonder if he will remember my name. I shake my head as if to shake off the wondering. I collect my purse and head out the front door.

* * *

_**Scene 2, Bobby**_

His back is killing him. Bobby is passed out face first into his pillow. He hates to sleep on his stomach. He cannot fathom why he is sleeping on his stomach. The alarm is blaring in his small bedroom, shaking his every brain cell. He lays still for a moment, afraid to move his back, afraid to move his body, afraid of making something hurt worse than it already does. He holds his breath in his lungs and manages to roll over onto his back. He throws his forearm over his eyes. With his left hand he smacks the alarm to snooze. His mouth is dry, his mind wrapped in cotton. Something is wrong, and it's not his back. Someone has been in his bed. He can smell her on the sheets.

The early light of dawn is creeping through the slats of the blinds on the windows. He needs to get moving if he is going to make it to work on time. He lumbers toward the bathroom, thinking the heat of the shower will work the kinks out of his back, maybe even clear the cotton from his brain. He stands in the small shower stall, palms pressed against the tile wall, leaning forward so the hot water of the shower pulverizes his spine.

This week is his mother's birthday - the first birthday since she passed away. He finds it strangely difficult. He has not yet grown accustomed to not seeing her, to not seeing to the details of her existence. Her birthday feels like an important marker of something. But he is not sure of what. So, he's been trying to put those uncomfortable thoughts aside. He has been trying to not sort through his life. He's been clocking more hours at work, and clocking the remainder at whatever place he stops to grab dinner on the way home, or whatever place he stops to grab a drink or two or four.

He steps from the shower, quickly toweling off. As he wraps the towel around his waist, he notices his shirt from last night draped on the robe hook. He reaches forward and picks up his shirt. He smells her on his shirt, she is musky, earthy - not floral. He recalls burying his face in the hollow of her throat the night before. He remembers the taste of her skin on his tongue, slightly salty from the sweat of their contact. He remembers her name – Sylvie. He wonders if she remembers his.

_**

* * *

**__**Scene 3, Sylvie**_

From the second I arrived at work to this very moment, I've been on my feet. My day was relentless. I'm standing in my kitchen, my eyes closed, thinking about bed. My brain betrays me by not providing me images of my bed, but instead bombards me with images of the bed I was in last night. What I did goes completely against type. Well, my type anyway. I have never, ever, picked a guy up with the express purpose of sleeping with him.

I pour myself a glass of deliciously dry red wine. Distractedly I swirl the goblet, watching the crimson liquid cling and slide against the sides. I take a generous sip before setting the glass gently onto the counter. I wonder - would he like this wine? He was drinking a rather nice scotch last night. I shake my head as if to shake him out of my thoughts.

I retrieve the glass of wine and head toward my bedroom. Discarding my clothes, I move to my closet for my nightgown and robe. I catch a glimpse of myself, naked, in the long mirror on the inside of my closet door. Uncharacteristically, I stand for a moment, examining my body. I've never felt especially comfortable in my skin. I wonder if it is the curse of my gender, to never be happy with what we were given.

Without realizing it, I am running the fingers of my right hand up the inside of my left wrist, across a faint lateral scar. It is as if I am outside myself looking in. Looking at the sad girl in the mirror. Time erases, and I am a teenager again, alone, fragile. Weird how reflections play tricks on you. It is as if we cannot see who we are today, we only see our weaknesses, our soft spots. I watch my fingertips run across a wound that makes me so self conscious that I often wear a wide filigree cuff on my left wrist to keep the evidence my troubled teenage years hidden.

I pull my nightgown on over my head and wrap the dark satin robe around my waist. The long bell sleeves of the robe cover my arms, but my eyes are still drawn to my wrists. I am thankful that I have just the one scar. If I had made it to two, I would not be standing here today.

I return to the kitchen to refresh my glass of wine. I nearly drop the glass as someone is knocking on my door. I move quietly to look through the peephole, hoping that whoever it is cannot hear me inside. I'm not sure that I want to answer. I cannot think of who would be stopping by my place, unannounced. I'm not exactly social with the people in my small building. There are only a couple of apartments in the converted building where I live, so I do know everyone by name, but I do not tend to visit with the others, and sit in their personal spaces and exchange details of our personal lives.

My breath stops as I look through the peephole in my door. I see Bobby Goren on the other side. Why is he here, knocking on my door – my one night stand who suddenly knows where I live. Leave it to me to choose a cop. He probably had my address within 5 minutes of arriving at work. I lean my forehead silently against the door, trying to decide what to do.

He knocks again. I jump back from the sound. I close my eyes and run the heels of my hands across my forehead. I cannot seem to think quickly. Maybe if I stand undecided long enough he will go away. My brain again inundates me with images of him, of his strong, lean hands, of the feel of his beard on my neck, of the way his breath catches in his throat when you kiss him just underneath his ear. He is about to walk away, but before he does, I impulsively step forward and open the door.

Apparently my desire for a hiatus from my life is more like a hiatus from common sense.

* * *

_**Scene 4, Bobby**_

Bobby pauses awkwardly, mid-walking away, thinking that she isn't home, thinking that it's ridiculous that he stopped by. He does have something of hers, a pair of earrings he found on the bed stand. So, he rationalizes he has an excuse for seeing her again. But, he could've easily phoned her, arranged to meet her some place public. As he pulled her phone number he also pulled her address. Throughout the day he has phone in hand, imagining an awkward conversation where he might have to reintroduce himself, explain that he is the guy from last night, and she left her earrings on his bed stand. Since he can't exactly imagine the conversation, he stops by her place.

"Oh," he says, somewhat surprised that she has opened her door. His hands are in his pockets, his left hand is fiddling with the silver drop ear rings. He is about to pull them out, hand them to her when she interrupts him by asking him to come inside. Her voice is soft, her smile tentative. But, she is stepping aside, making room for him to come in. The cop in him wonders what kind of person answers the door to a stranger and invites him in. Though, he thinks, after last night, perhaps strangers are no longer what they are.

"Can I get you a glass of wine?" She asks, as if they are old friends and it is perfectly fine for him to show up at her door.

"Sure," he says, surprising himself with his affirmative response. His purpose for stopping by is to simply give her the ear rings, but he knows as he stands there watching her pour the wine there are a million other far less concrete reasons why he stopped by.

He takes a sip of the wine. It is bitingly dry, exquisite, he thinks. He watches her, realizing that he is more familiar with the feel of her underneath his hands, the smell of her on his sheets, he can even recall the sound of her breathing as his hands slide her ribs and across her navel. Strangely, he is less familiar with how she looks. If he had run into her on the street today his is not certain he would have known her at first, out of context from his bed. He attended to many details of her the night before, none of which included the fact that she has jet black hair, cut even just underneath her chin, wide spaced eyes of no particular color, which he guesses makes them hazel, that she is fair skinned and she has freckles. All of the details you don't necessarily notice in the dark when you are doing most of the seeing by feeling with your hands, with your skin on her sweet skin.

"Would you…?" She asks, offering to refill his glass. He is surprised that he has drained the contents. He nods, affirmatively, thinking more wine would be nice. He takes a sip of the fresh glass and sets the goblet on the counter, knowing that if he continues to hold the wine in his hand he will drain the second glass as quickly as the first.

He realizes that freeing his hands is a mistake. He finds himself reaching out with his left hand toward the side of her face. He stops just short of sliding her thick black hair behind her ear. He is distracted momentarily by the absence of ear rings, reminded of his purpose for stopping by. Before he can proffer her ear rings, she yields into his halting touch, her cheek in his hand, her hands on his chest.

He didn't stop by for this, but his body aches for this. He aches for human contact, for touch. He is lonely, the chaos of his life these past few years are his excuse for his lack of relationships. And she is so sweet, and so soft, and he can feel her trembling and aching for him. And he wonders why he feels more connected with a stranger than he does with the people in his life. She does not know him so she cannot judge him, or feel sad for him, or frightened of him, or disappointed in him. So with her, he feels like he can forget himself for a while. Which is exactly what he needs, for now.

* * *

_**Scene 5, Sylvie**_

I'm standing in my bathroom, wrapped in a towel, splashing water across my face. It's only about 5 in the morning and there is someone sound asleep in my bed. Up until about 20 minutes ago, I was sound asleep as well. Strange how I sleep better when someone else is in my bed. I am horrible at sleep. But last night I slept for 4 hours without waking up once. Amazing for me, I think.

I turn off the water and step into the darkness of my bedroom. I can see the outline of him underneath my blankets. The length of him occupies almost the entire length of my bed. I wonder how someone so tall, and so broad, and so strong can feel so fragile.

"Were you in the shower?" His voice is sleepy. He pushes himself up on his elbows to look at me. My skin breaks out in goosebumps.

"No," I say, "not yet…"

"Would you like to…" He's out of the bed, his arms around me, deftly undoing my towel, letting it drop to the floor. He backs me toward the dark bathroom, inviting me to join him. I'm nodding, my voice is failing me.

As he's getting ready to leave, I'm sitting on the edge of the bed watching him dress. He is putting his weapon in place. My brain splinters into a million questions. _How long have you been a cop? How long have you lived in New York? Do you have any family? What is your favorite color? What kind of music do you like to listen to? Do you even like to listen to music?_ All of the things I might know had we started by engaging in conversation.

We are backwards. We know each others bodies better than we know each others histories. Maybe that is just as well. My history is not exactly one that is easy to share, and I sense the same in him. So for now our details remain our own. But, our feelings are each others. I know his lonely, I know his lust, I know his tenderness, and I know his playful. And, I know all these things without knowing the name of the place where he grew up or the name of the girl he first loved, if he's ever loved, which I think he has or how else can he know lonely.

"It's my mother's birthday today." He offers as he pulls on his jacket. "She passed away, but today is her birthday." I look at him, not knowing what to say, so I don't say anything. He closes the distance between us and runs his hands through my hair, pushing the thick strands behind my ears. He looks at me for a moment and reaches into his pocket. "You left these…" His left hand contains the ear rings I was wearing the other night. I hadn't even realized I left them at his place. He drops them into my hand and tilts my face upward to his. He kisses me so perfectly that I forget to ask him about his mother and I forget to thank him for returning my ear rings, I simply want to thank him by repeating last night. But he mumbles something about having to get to work, having a case he would like to close, about seeing me later, and I hold onto that, and I watch him go.

* * *

_**Scene 6, Sylvie**_

Chopin. I'm standing in front of the bookshelf where I keep my vinyl records. My fingers tick along their slender spines, blindly finding the tattered edge of an album I often play when I'm feeling blue.

My grandmother was a music teacher. She loved Chopin's Preludes. She would play them all the time. When she left this earth, she left me these, and now I play them all the time. I softly set the needle on the record. It is the sound of happiness. It is the sound of my grandmother.

My phone ringing makes me jump. I grab for the receiver and answer, my voice hoarse from lack of use. It's been hours since I left work, hours since I've spoken to anyone.

"Did I wake you?" He says without preamble.

"No," I reply, the voice familiar. Odd, I think to myself, how something can become familiar so quickly.

"Chopin." He says.

"Yes." I smile. I like that he recognizes the music.

"Am I too late?" He asks, and my mind fractures into a hundred different directions. _Too late to listen to Chopin? _No, I just put the record on. _Too late to come over? _No, I'm fairly certain that I would've let him come over even if he'd woken me up. _Too late in my life?_ Perhaps.

"Too late?" I say, putting at bay all of the other _too lates _my mind is generating.

"To come over," he murmurs.

"No, you're not too late," I close my eyes. "Come over." I say.

He's kissing me before he makes it through the door. I think it might be our way of saying hello. We simply start tearing at each other's clothes, at each other's mouths, at each other - so desperate for contact, so hungry for touch, so easy to forget ourselves by getting lost in the moment of each other.

"Raindrop." He says, now his voice is hoarse. We are laying on each other on the sofa. Chopin's Preludes have reset, played to the end and through, causing the needle to lift and begin again. I trace my fingers along his neck, slick with sweat. His fingers are dancing down my spine, his touch feels like raindrops. The complexity of Chopin's Prelude in D Flat Major washes over us.

"Raindrop." I repeat his word, the informal name for the prelude. "You know Chopin."

"I know a lot of things…" his voice is a rumble in his chest, and I believe him, I believe that he knows a lot of things. He definitely knows how to get to me.

It's before dawn, he's leaving my bed. He's sitting on the edge, I'm sitting behind him, kind of straddled around him. He's dressed. I'm not. I've only just recently shrugged into my nightgown. I'm using him for warmth, leaning against his back, enjoying the mundane motions of his muscles moving as he's tying his shoes.

"I went by, you know, to leave some flowers for my mother…" he starts talking about his yesterday. "There was this picture, of me and my brother… " he continues as if I know the details of his life, which I don't, but I'm putting them together. "I don't think he left it, my brother, someone else must've left it…" he says, I lean my head against the softness of his shirt, "My mother…" he says, he's stopped tying his shoes, he's stopped moving, I can feel the rhythm and depth of his breathing change, "…she wasn't easy… she didn't have an easy…" he sighs, his chest a slow rise and fall, "I… we, I… didn't…" he stops, but I mentally complete his sentence - he did not have an easy life, his brother did not have an easy life. "Frank, um, my brother…" he stumbles over his words, over his thoughts, over what he would like to share with me. "I'm going to go by his place. We haven't seen each other in a while. I should go by his place. I tried to call him last night. He didn't pick up. I'll go by his place." He's repeating himself, reminding himself of what he plans to do. He pushes himself to standing. I'm cold, my skin is cold because the heat of him has moved away from me. "Maybe tonight we could…" He's looking at me.

"Tonight." I say, agreeing with him, not really caring what he was about to say. We could do whatever tonight, whatever he was about to say. He nods.

"You look beautiful." His words stun me. I'm suddenly very aware of my disheveled form sprawled straddled on my bed. My lips are bruised from his kisses, my skin is burned from his beard. I feel vulnerable, I feel bare, I feel beautiful. He kisses me and then he's gone.

_**

* * *

**_

_**Scene 7, Sylvie **_

Lost. I think. I'm headed to answer my front door. It's 2:00 in the morning, I've lost sleep. I think Bobby's lost track of time. I pause for a breath before I answer. Maybe I should let him think I'm asleep and that I cannot hear him at the door. Maybe I should let him wonder if I'm even home. Maybe I should just open the damn door.

Lost. I think. He looks lost standing in my doorway. He looks like he's lost sleep as well. He's also lost track of how much he can drink and remain standing. He's leaning heavily against the jamb.

"Am I too late?" He asks, the same question he asked last night. I don't say anything. I simply stand, watching him. And again, my brain starts chasing down all of the ways that this thing between us may be too late. He's looking at me, leaning into me. I think he's going to kiss me, but instead he kind of falls forward onto me and I stagger backward underneath the weight of him. I catch myself, back against the wall. He catches himself, palms on the wall on either side of me.

I'm drawn into touching him. I trace the line from below his ear to the hollow above his collar bone. He closes his eyes to my touch. He lets go of the wall to grab a hold of me, which is a mistake, because he can barely stand, so we slip to the floor. He's on his knees, I'm straddled around him, my arms loosely around his neck. With his left hand he is lightly tracing the features of my face. I close my eyes as he skims across my eyebrows and eye lashes, as his fingertips slide down my cheek bones, as his thumb presses against my lips. It's as if he's trying to remember something, as if he's trying to connect with something.

Lost, I think. He's lacking the assurance I associate with him. Something has happened, something has shifted within him, stripped him of his balance. He rocks me backward, keeping me straddled around his waist as he lies me down on the floor. Millimeter by millimeter he plays his fingers across the rise and fall of my breast bone of my breasts. I gasp, underneath his touch.

He pushes the thin straps of my nightgown over my shoulders and shimmies the satin material down across my body and off across my legs. He's kissing me, my jaw, my throat, my navel. He's using me. I know this. Something has happened, and he's using me to get lost in me.

"My brother turned up dead," He says, running his hand roughly across his beard, across his face, like he can't feel even his own touch anymore. I'm caught over his strange use of words. _Turned up dead - his brother_. I touch him lightly, my fingertips to his chest. He's not looking at me, his gaze fixed on a point at some random unfocused distance. "He's a junkie," he adds, so I think his brother ODed. "I went by his place this morning..." As he continues talking, I lay my hand flat out on his chest, trying to feel for his heart. His tone is flat, like a cop, but something in his breathing is broken. "Something's not right," he sighs. "He fell out his window, maybe he was high, but something's not right…" he's mumbling the words, again rubbing his hand roughly across his face like he's trying to feel something that he cannot seem to feel. Lost, I think, he's lost.

**_

* * *

_**

**_Scene 8, Sylvie_**

It's the third time in the past 30 minutes that my phone is ringing. The first two times, I successfully ignored the loud blasts of sound. I think it's my work trying to reach me and I don't want to answer. I don't want to deal, so I don't look at the phone, because if I see caller ID and I know its work, then I know myself and I will answer. But, if I pretend that it is "unknown caller" as in some solicitor or someone I don't know, then it feels Ok not to answer. It's the third time, so I think that maybe something might be wrong. So, I answer. As I snatch up the receiver, I'm surprised to see the number that appears on my caller ID.

"Hello." I can see that it is Bobby. When he left my place the other day, he fell off the face of the earth. Well, he fell of the face of the earth that I occupy. My brain has been telling me that his vanishing act is normal. His brother died, unexpectedly. The rational part of me knows that the time we've spent together feels like pretend. The death of his brother is a harsh and real.

"Hi," he says, his voice is gravelly, tired. "What're you doing?" he asks as I scroll through caller ID and see that it is his number that has been calling me for the past ½ hour.

"Um…" I say, not really able to say what I've been doing. I've been stupidly avoiding the phone.

"Play Chopin for me," his words take me completely off guard. He sounds distant - in the way that you sound when you call from far away, and distant - in the way that you sound when your brain is completely consumed by something else.

"Sure," I say and I walk across my place and pull out the vinyl of Chopin's Preludes that we listened to the other night.

"Louder," he asks. So, I turn up the volume and move to sit in my favorite chair, knees tucked up to my chest, listening to him listen to Chopin. "I'm in Phoenix," he says, surprising me. Kind of an explanation why I haven't heard from him in a while, but he does not say how or even if that relates to the death of his brother. "In the airport, headed back to New York," he sighs, and I can imagine him doing that t hing he does when he runs his hand along the back of his neck.

I want to ask him what is happening, what has him in Phoenix, but I don't ask him anything. He didn't call me and ask me to play Chopin so he could talk about what is going on. He called me and asked me to play Chopin so he could forget about what is going on.

"Tell me about something, anything…" he asks, confirming that I'm right about the reasons why he called. "Where are you from?" he leads me into talking. I smile over his question. We haven't exchanged the basics. Though, I believe he is from New York. Something about the way he talks, the way he moves, the way he seems to own the city.

"Savannah," I say.

"Really?" he sounds surprised. "You don't sound like you're from Savannah, that is, until you just said the word _Savannah_." He drawls out the word, slow and southern.

"My grandmother - I grew up with my grandmother in Savannah. She sounds," I say… "well, she sounded like Savannah." I change the tense, still strangely not accustomed to her absence on this earth. I close my eyes, and continue talking, telling him about something, anything. "In a white house, with black shutters, and a red front door." I continue. "She had a parlor, the kind just to the left as you walk in the front door. Where you entertain people. That's where she kept her piano." My mind wanders to picturing my grandmother's parlor, the yellowed white walls, the wide dark wood trim, the ancient wood floors. "Most people though, who knew us anyway, always came in through the side porch."

"That's a southern thing," he observes.

"A porch?" I ask.

"Um, well that too, but coming in through the side porch."

"I guess." I allow. I'm quiet for a moment, listening to Chopin, thinking about my grandmother, feeling the house of my childhood in my mind.

"How old were you?" He interrupts my thoughts.

"How old was I when?"

"When your grandmother passed away."

"Not old enough." I breathe in sharply through my nose over the memory.

"Not old enough for what?" he asks.

"To live on my own," I allow, my voice has a faint quality to it, an ache I can't seem to hide. "I was 12." I clear my throat and shift in my chair.

"The ring you wear…" he starts to say, causing me to look down at my right hand at the wide scrolled platinum band, "was that hers?"

"Yeah." I say, I have tears in my throat, I can't swallow them down.

"You trace your thumb over it, turning it on your hand, when you're thinking," he offers, and I am reminded his job is all about the details.

In the background on his side of the phone, I begin to hear announcements in the airport and someone calling his name. I sit silently waiting for him to tell me he needs to go. He doesn't say anything. For a moment, he simply sits silently as well. We are listening to Chopin, we are listening to each other.

"They're boarding," his tone is exasperated, "I have to go," I can almost hear him standing, I can hear someone talking to him, her tone is urgent, also exasperated. "Don't turn it off," his voice is quiet now, the sound in the background has died down a bit. I'm not sure that he's talking to me.

"What?" I say, not following him.

"The Chopin, let it play through and reset and play again. Listen for me," he urges. Again, I have a million questions. I want to ask him if he's Ok, even though I know he's not.

"Ok," I say, his whisper has me whispering in return.

"Sylvie…" he says, and I break at the sound of him saying my name.

"Yes?"

"Nothing, I have to go…" And, he's gone.

* * *

_**A/N:**_ ...still Hiatus, still writing, I think...


	2. Chapter 2

**_Scene 9, _****_Sylvie_**

"Have you ever read _Moby Dick_?" He asks me. He came to my place from the airport. I'm draped across him, my left arm thrown over his bare chest. He has my hand in his, playing his fingers through mine, rubbing his thumb idly across my palm, across my wrist. His touches are wildly erotic. I'm having a hard time focusing on his question.

"No," I say, shivers running down my spine. The juxtaposition of his question with the fact that we are tangled naked together in my bed is making my brain spin. "Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Salinger…" I murmur, trying to engage in a seemingly intellectual conversation, "I've read them, and Twain of course," I refer a bit to my southern roots.

"You've never read _Moby Dick_?" he asks again, still distracting me with his soft touches. "No," I say again, I'm drowsy now, comfortable with him, safe with him in my bed. He doesn't say anything more, and I don't ask.

When I wake up a few hours later, my bed is empty. I'm alone. I let my eyes focus on the bed stand clock, just after 4:00 in the morning. My eyes catch sight of his shoes on the floor, and I realize that perhaps I'm not alone, I'm simply alone in the bed. So, I slide out from under the blankets and slip into my robe, and wander toward the kitchen.

I study his large frame sitting in my small kitchen chair. He is holding a tiny pint sized container of ice cream, eating straight from the small container with a large serving spoon. Contradictions. He fills my mind with contradictions.

"I could get you something… something better to eat…" I offer, my voice still hushed from being asleep.

"There's something better than this?" he refers to the ice cream. He likes ice cream. I like that he likes ice cream. What's not to like?

"I don't know, something more substantial…" I suggest, still caught in his contradictions.

"I think a pint of ice cream can be pretty filling," he continues to eat, and I notice that he is not exaggerating. He's almost eaten the entire container. "Want some?" he asks, and I nod, turning to get myself a spoon. "You don't need your own spoon," he grabs my hand and pulls me into his lap, offering me a large melty bite from his spoon. I'm able to take about half of the spoonful, licking my lips to keep the softened ice cream from dripping across my chin.

"You're dressed," I observe, all except for his shoes which are in the bedroom, so again I convince myself that he would've had to come back in to the bedroom before he left.

"Yeah," he sets the ice cream aside, licks the spoon. "I need to go soon, but I got distracted by the ice cream…" he smiles, but his smile does not reach the creases of his eyes.

"It's distracting - ice cream, can be distracting," I allow, knowing that he is not distracted by the ice cream. There is something much bigger going on in his life, and he's using my four walls and this pint of ice cream to hide out.

"Eames, she's picking me up at my place – early," he shifts my position on his lap, moves my legs so they are straddling him, we are sitting, chest to chest. He runs his fingers across my shoulders, across my collar bone. He is so tactile, always touching me, as if by simply touching something, he is able to distract his mind.

"Picking you up?" I ask.

"Yeah, we have to go to Pittsfield," his thumbs are running along the tops of my breasts.

"Massachusetts," I manage to say. He's a champion at distraction. "Is that why…?" I start to ask a question but I lose track of it.

"Why what?" he moves his hands away from my breasts, back up to my shoulders.

"Is that why you asked me about _Moby Dick_?" I remember my American authors enough to know that's where Melville wrote _Moby Dick_. I brush my fingers through his hair. I would like to see his smile reach the crinkles near his eyes. He's stopped moving his hands over me. He's holding me, considering me. I know it's all tied together, the death of his brother, his trip to Phoenix, going to Pittsfield. He doesn't answer me, he simply kisses me. Butter brickle. He tastes like the butter brickle ice cream. He's not going to answer me because he's trying not to think about it. He resumes caressing me, he returns his hands to the tops of my breasts. He doesn't leave to meet Eames just yet.

* * *

_**Scene 10, **__**Sylvie**_

I have a cup of coffee in one hand, my purse is on my shoulder, I'm standing in a coffee shop, and my phone is ringing. Luckily, I've paid so I grab 2 sugars and step toward a table, plopping down into a chair, my legs splayed awkwardly. At least I don't spill the coffee.

"Hello," I answer, clear my throat and say, "Hello," again.

"Hello?" Bobby replies. "Sylvie?" He asks, making me think I must sound weird.

"Yes, yes, it's me. Sorry," I breathe in deeply audibly, rearranging my legs into a more suitable position, squishing the sugar packets between my fingers, feeling the granules slip and slide underneath the paper casing.

"Did I catch you at a bad time?" He asks, and I almost laugh, that nervous inappropriate laugh when something strikes you as funny but it shouldn't. Did _he_ catch _me_ at a bad time? I'm fairly certain it is the other way around.

"No, no," I say, thinking that he sounds funny, like he's in an auditorium, I can hear his voice echo. I wonder if it is the cell phone line. "Where are you?"

"What?" he asks.

"Um, you sound funny, an echo," I provide, still mashing the sugar between my finger tips.

"Oh, I'm in a stairwell," he provides. And, I have an instant visual of him hunched on the small steps of a stairwell, cell phone in one hand, his head in the other. "I was just with the ME, getting some information on a case," he pauses, well, I think he actually shudders, at least it sounds like his breath is shuddering in his chest. "It was unexpected, the information…" he exhales as he's talking as if he's still grappling with what he just learned.

"What…" I start to ask him, but he cuts me off.

"What're you doing?" he re-directs the conversation.

"Putting sugar in my coffee," I go for the literal.

"This time of day, you're drinking coffee?" he asks.

"Coffee is good any time of day," I say, as I dump the sugar in and swirl the dark liquid in the cup. And he laughs in such a way that he seems surprised that he can laugh. I smile, wishing I could see if his laughter reaches the creases of his eyes.

"What're you wearing?" he asks, trying to fill his head with details other than the details of whatever he is working on.

"Black skirt, grey shirt," I look down at myself, and realize that is probably not the level of detail his brain is after, if he's trying to distract himself, he's going to need a little bit more. "My skirt is soft, straight, and to the knee. The slit is on the front over my left knee, my thigh." I briefly touch my thigh with my hand, then move my hand to my shirt. "It's silk, my shirt, not shiny, but smooth, slips through my fingers," I look down my legs. "My legs are bare, my heels are black, peep toe so you can see my deep red polish."

"A peep toe," he repeats, he has a slight smile in his voice, wonder over the fact that designers have a name for everything. "Let's go back to the skirt, you're left thigh…" he says, "bare…"

"Bare," I say. The tone of the conversation is not what you think. It is not entirely sexual. It's more like he's tracing me with his fingers, like he does when he's with me, like he does when he's trying to regain touch with the world, with something normal within the world.

"Sylvie," he says my name as if he has more to say and doesn't quite know where to begin. I wait on the line for him to continue, but he does not say anything further. I can hear voices in the background, echoing in the stairwell. "I'll call you later.," he whispers, and he hangs up the phone.

**_

* * *

_****_Scene 11, _****_Bobby_**

Prime numbers. Bobby feels like his life is passing in prime numbers.

His 47th year – quite possibly the hardest year of his life.

It took 337 minutes in the air to get to Phoenix, about 2,143 miles.

He spent about 7 seconds reading the note from Nicole Wallace, and about another 17 seconds figuring out the meaning of the return address.

Pittsfield by car is about 3 hours, with traffic. He looked at the heart for about 2 seconds before he felt sick.

It felt like Rodgers repeated 31 times that the heart belonged to Nicole Wallace, and even then Bobby couldn't seem to believe it.

He had sat in interview with Declan for 71 minutes before he allowed his brain to come to the truth of what was happening. And after they took Declan away, he remained sitting in interview for another 41 minutes.

It took Eames about 29 minutes to convince him to let her bring him home, and they'd sat in silence in her car for 23 minutes with her insisting she should come up. Finally, Bobby had simply gotten out and walked away.

So, now he sits outside of his apartment, on the floor of the hallway, back against the wall. He cannot bring himself to go inside. Prime numbers. 11 days since he met Sylvie, 7 times he's seen her in those 11. 53 hours since he left her to go to Pittsfield. 37 hours since he'd called her. Her phone number is comprised of prime numbers, 2s, 3s, 5s, and 7s. Except for the exchange. His brain slips to her grandmother, a music teacher, to Chopin. Prime, the first note on a musical scale or the interval between two notes on the same staff degree. He reaches for his phone and calls her. It rings twice, 2 short bursts of sound.

"Hello?" She answers, but he cannot say anything, his sound is caught in his chest. "Bobby?" She says his name.

"Can you, um…" he starts to speak and stalls, "can you, um…" again, he starts to speak, "can you come pick me up?" Third time, prime.

"Yeah," she says, without even knowing where he is. "Yes, yes, I can come get you."

"I'm um, I'm…" his voice is raw, his words disconnected. He tells her where he is.

"5 minutes." She says, prime number. She must be close by. But you can't get any place in New York in 5 minutes. It takes her 11.

"Eames, she brought home. I was Ok, you know, on the ride, thinking I should come home. Then, um…" He gestures to the door, "I just, uh, I just can't go in." He shrugs, shifting his eyes to look at her. "So I've been here a while" He doesn't elaborate on how long. She kneels down in front of him and he pulls her across his lap. He's tired of prime numbers.

"2," he says, softly tracing the outline of her ears with his fingers. "4." He moves his hands to her heart, thinking about the chambers. "6 dimples," he observes the 4 dimples on her face and then he moves his hands from her face and down her lower back, he can feel something shift inside of him as his fingers find her sacral dimples. "8." He continues to distract himself with her body as he kisses her fingers, excluding her thumbs, "10." He kisses her thumbs, cheating a little. "12." He ripples his fingertips down her 12 pairs of ribs. That's when she leans in and kisses him.

They don't kiss for long, because he pulls her into his arms, close against him, and holds her there, burying his face in her neck until his breathing matches hers. She doesn't know about his week, about his year. She doesn't know a lot about him. He figures she knows he's hurting, she knows he's sad, and he is fairly certain that she knows sometimes he uses her to forget. But he is smart enough to know that she's doing the same with him. He can feel the sadness in her, in the way she listens to her grandmother's records, in the way she turns the platinum band on her finger, in the way she shivers when he touches the scar on the inside of her wrist. She has a past, she has things she keeps to herself, same as him.

"I have to go to Savannah this weekend," she says. She does not say why. He does not care. What she says sounds perfect to him. He likes the way she says the word – Savannah.

He needs to get away. He needs to find some mental space. A hiatus. He's got a week. Ross made it clear he didn't want to see him for a week. But he does not want to be alone. He cannot imagine shambling through his place alone. Hell, when he got home, he couldn't even imagine going inside.

"I could show you Savannah," she murmurs against his neck. Her warmth, her shape, the sound of her, she is becoming familiar.

"I would like to see Savannah," Bobby has not relaxed his hold on her. She's still buried against him, their breathing still the same. He would like to see Savannah, he would like to see a bit of her, and maybe, show her a bit more of him. Savannah – about 719 miles as the crow flies… prime number, he thinks.


End file.
